Arrested pipeline protesters to challenge charges
Published 9:00 am Friday, April 7, 2017
- The Sabal Trail Pipeline protesters outside Suwannee County Courthouse on Tuesday.
LIVE OAK, Fla. — Six of the Sabal Trail Pipeline protesters arrested on Martin Luther King Jr. day, Jan. 16, appeared in court at the Suwannee County Courthouse on Tuesday.
One took an agreement for 50 hours of community service with the charges dropped. For Alexa Oropesa and Kaithleen Hernandez, the two protesters who locked themselves to the bottom of a Sabal Trail truck, they will face one year probation with 50 hours of community service and a $600 fine.
The last three protesters will challenge the charges in court, according to their attorney Steven Glazer, of Crawfordville. Glazer said he was born to defend people like this.
“I’ve been where they are,” Glazer said. “Been there done that. Now it’s up to six Suwannee people to determine if any laws were broken that day.”
Glazer said that the jury will be chosen April 24 with the court case being determined after that.
The trial comes after tensions flared between police and protesters at a pipeline access road located near the Suwannee River after a weekend-long protest where more than 500 people across the country participated. The protest remained calm over the weekend, but things changed on Monday.
A smaller group of protesters went the access road, and while police were distracted, Oropesa and Hernandez locked themselves to the bottom of a pipeline truck.
Protests have been attempting to delay the project since October of last year. This act was the last real push from the protesters to gain attention for their cause.
Oropesa and Hernandez said they feel like their action made a positive impact. More than 400,000 people viewed their videos, and they managed to disrupt the drilling process, even if only for a short amount of time.
The Sabal Trail Transmission is a 515-mile interstate natural gas pipeline to provide energy services for Alabama, Florida and Georgia. The project is a joint-venture of Spectra Energy Corp., NextEra Energy, Inc. and Duke Energy. The pipeline was approved in October 2013 and is expected to be completed this June, according to its website.
